Libra Ascending: An Epic Urban Fantasy Romance (Zodiac Guardians Book 1) by Tamar Sloan (top ten books of all time txt) 📕

Tristan indicates with his chin, his eyes scanning the empty street. “The white one at the end.”

Frowning, Brielle leans forward as she tries to see what has Tristan on edge. “Then why have we stopped?”

Tristan’s stomach plummets as his suspicions are confirmed. It was the slightest shift of a shadow that had him pulling over. The whopping piece of information that he’d forgotten in his haste to get Brielle to the stones.

He was a fool to think that he was taking Brielle to safety.

That it would be easy to reunite Brielle with her gem.

The Skins know where he lives.

20

Brielle

Brielle’s pulse pounds so furiously in her temples that she fears her head might explode.

How did this even happen? Only an hour ago, she was taking the first steps into her new cozy life with the Pierces, about to enjoy a simple dessert in what promised to be her new home.

Now, after a high octane car chase that almost killed them, she’s in Tristan’s truck up the road from his house with no clue as to who’s after them or why she just threw away the one thing she’s spent her entire life wanting.

“Tristan?” she prompts as Tristan stares toward his house, gritting his teeth, still not having answered her question.

“They have my house surrounded,” he says quietly.

She looks at the houses in front of them, scanning each one for signs of bodies. But the neighborhood looks as empty and peaceful as any for this time of night.

“There’s nothing there, Tristan,” she says, barely breathing.

“Just because you can’t see them doesn’t mean they aren’t there. They can become invisible whenever they choose. They were real enough to chase us down with that SUV.”

She can’t take it anymore. There’s no more denying or trying to explain away. She has to accept what’s happening. But first, she needs to actually know what’s happening.

“Who are they?” she asks finally, hammering the final nail in the coffin of her normal life.

Tristan turns to her, then takes a steadying breath as if preparing himself for the long explanation that’s to come. “We call them Skins. They’re people who’ve been possessed by Chardis. They’re his puppets, robbed of whatever choice and soul they had before he infected them in exchange for heightened strength and speed and the ability to go unseen at will.”

She swallows, the gulp audible in the silence of the truck. “Who is Chardis, and what does he want with me?”

“Chardis is…damn, Zarius could explain this so much better.” He looks at his house again, chewing his lip and combing his hand through his hair before turning back to her. “Chardis is basically a conscious mass of dark matter. He has no soul, no empathy, no concept of right and wrong. He’s pure evil, and the most destructive force in the Universe. Do you remember I told you that I and the other Zodiac Heirs were sent to Earth after an attack on our space station?”

She nods, eager to hear more.

Tristan continues. “He was the one who attacked. The history of the Universe has been one long battle between Chardis and the Zodiac Guardians. We’re the only thing powerful enough to fend him off, to stop him from destroying one planet after another. Centuries ago, previous Zodiac Guardians sealed him away in a prison that was supposed to be impenetrable, but he managed to escape, and now that he has, he’ll stop at nothing to kill off every last Zodiac Heir before we can come into our true power. That the Skins are after you can only mean one thing—you are a Zodiac Heir.”

Her head is shaking before she even realizes it. “You made this all sound so fantastical earlier. Princesses and magic and soulmates.” Her eyes narrow at him. “You never said anything about people wanting to kill me. You lied to me, Tristan.”

His shoulders slump. “I didn’t lie, I just left some things out.”

“Omission is lying, it’s just a form that I can’t detect,” she retorts. “And you used that against me.”

“I had to,” he insists. “If I had told you about the assassins after you, about the fate of the Universe being in our hands, you would have shut me down for good. I needed you to want it, needed to get you close to the stones.”

He’d said something about stones during the chase, when she was buzzing with too much adrenaline to ask about it. “What stones?”

“The Zodiac Gems are what allow us to access our full power.” He pulls the purple gem at the end of his necklace out from under his shirt collar. “When a Zodiac Heir touches their stone for the first time, it glows, recognizing its new master. And it will only glow if its Zodiac Guardian touches it.”

“That was the test you were talking about,” she says. “The reason why you wanted me to come to your house.”

He nods.

“And what does that whole soulmate thing have to do with anything?” she asks sharply, still sour about being manipulated by that topic.

“For all the regions of the Universe, there is one Guardian, one person endowed with unique powers to protect that region of space. But the Gemini sector has two Guardians, one male and one female. Both born at the exact time on each of the twin planets that govern the region. Two halves of one soul, they are destined to be each other’s perfect match. And when their two powers come together, there is no force more powerful. I am the male Gemini Heir.” His fingers absentmindedly rub the stone hanging from his neck. “It’s my duty, my purpose, to find the female Gemini Heir.”

Tristan’s got that look in his eyes again, that look that bores into her soul, both seeking and filling a need at the same time.

“And you think I could be her.” The hostility has left her voice, and her pulse has actually slowed.

Tristan nods. “There are too many signs. The way I feel about you, that pull…